s the title of this conference suggests, the future of the committal hearing is now under something of a cloud. Calls to abolish, or substantially truncate, committal hearings have been loudest in New South Wales, where caseload pressures on the criminal justice system have been greatest (NSW Law Reform Commission 1987the Byrne Report, p. 299ff; Coopers & Lybrand W.D. Scott 1989, pp. 19-39; The NSW White Paper 1989, pp. 19-39; Bishop 1989, Ch.3). In other states the emphasis has been more on streamlining committal hearings than on replacing them altogether, but in these jurisdictions also, a growing number of interested parties are asking whether committals serve any useful purpose. At the same time, as indicated by the intense debate now taking place in New South Wales, there is still a substantial body of opinion which favours the retention of committals and sees them as an indispensable safeguard for the protection of defendants. In late 1988, in response to the increasing attention being paid to this issue, the Australian Institute of Judicial Administration (AIJA) commissioned us to undertake an Australia-wide study of committal proceedings. Our brief was to: provide a descriptive overview of how committals are conducted in the various jurisdictions; evaluate the adequacy of existing arrangements, and develop a set of policy recommendations on the basis of this analysis. As part of this project, we visited all jurisdictions except the Northern Territory, conducted a wide range of interviews with relevant personnel, and accumulated a large amount of comparative data. The present paper summarises the main findings of this research and in the light of these findings briefly considers some proposals for reform. The argument to be advanced in this paper is that, rather than being costly anachronisms, committals still play a useful role in the criminal justice system, and could be made even more effective with some modifications. Specifically, it is argued that committals: